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My Kind of Town Don Chapman |
LAMA ON THE LAM
The right to glow
>> Kaneohe
When they came upstairs from Joe Kharma's computer lab and found Kamasami Khan on the phone, Khan could see that everything had changed between Bodhicita Guzman and the young lama. His head was glowing again, and she had a certain glow going too.
"OK, get back to me," he said, ended the call.
"Guess what, Khan," she said with equal parts bliss and yikes! "We go way back, Jey and me. I'm his eternal consort."
The second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa nodded.
"They know each other from god land," Joe said, still not quite believing what he'd seen on his VR screens when he hooked Jey up to the sensors and Jey chanted himself into a trance. "They had three heads and six arms."
"Sparshavajra," she said, "that's my name over there. But Jey says you can still call me Bodhicita."
"Glad to know it," Khan said. "Three heads and six arms, eh. I could use that right about now."
"How may I help," the young lama said compassionately.
"Protecting you from Te-Wu, your holiness, requires many arms and heads. The good news, though, is that the Chinese seem to believe that you are still at your Waikiki hotel, and others are in the crowd that awaits your arrival at your parents' home."
"Omigod, I totally forgot!" Joe blurted. "I gotta go!"
"You got time," Khan said. "I was about to give you a yell."
"Are you sure I have to be there?"
"At your parents' home for your brother's homecoming? And the dedication of a shrine at the place where he realized his Buddhahood? Brother Joe, you crazy or what? You're not there, everybody including the media going wonder why. So get your okole in gear."
Joe hesitated.
"Don't worry about Te-Wu. We have some boys over there too."
"Who?"
"Don't matter, just act glad to see your 'brother.'"
Joe left, his real brother went out to the lanai for his tea.
Khan turned on Bodhicita. "What the hell you think you're doing?"
"Don't I have the right?!" she shot back.
"The right to do what?"
"To follow Jey, to serve him, to learn from him, to love him. I do have that right!"
"Oh, I thought you meant the right to screw up everything."
"I'd never do that."
"Mm-hm. By the way, your cell rang several times while you were downstairs, and you left it on speaker. Your lover boy Fon Du is anxious to see you. And he's going to need a massage tonight."
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Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek. His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin. He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com